


INDIANA MOON

by vanhunks



Category: Star Trek: Voyager
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-09
Updated: 2016-09-09
Packaged: 2018-08-14 01:40:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,491
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7993927
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vanhunks/pseuds/vanhunks
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kathryn and Chakotay share some very tender moments before all hell breaks loose when they are under attack by the Krenim. [Based on "Year of Hell"]. First written around 1998.</p>
            </blockquote>





	INDIANA MOON

**Author's Note:**

> **Note 1** : This story is not so much an episode addition as it is a "what if" scenario. What I have done, was take the "what if" premise and built it into fact for my story. What if history didn't reset? To say anything more here, would be to create foreshadowing, and the reader filled with certain expectations that I do not wish to divulge at this point.
> 
>  **Note 2** : This story is a fantastic tale, a legend. I have taken liberal liberties with the episode and woven my own takes on the events. It is a story of imagination, though not the ending everyone hoped for. So please, do sit back and go along for the ride.
> 
> Some quote form "Surprised by Joy" by C.S. Lewis.
> 
> Disclaimer: I do not own the characters.

* * *

**A Legend**

* * *

The light was at ten percent illumination in her quarters. Through the viewport the streaking stars cast an eerie glow over the two figures on the couch. They were silhouettes, their figures just barely discernible, just barely thrown into relief. It was quiet with a companionable silence that hung in the air.

Kathryn Janeway reclined, relaxed for the first time in months. Her head rested against the back of the couch, her eyes closed and her mouth curved into a half smile. Chakotay lay on his back, fully stretched, his head resting on her lap, his face turned towards her, nuzzling gently against her bosom. Kathryn absently stroked his short cropped hair, trying to twine her fingers into it with some futility. But she relished the feel of it, especially when her fingers would stray to his tattoo, tracing every line in one long smooth action. She lay back, arching her neck and sighed contentedly. Chakotay broke the silence.

"Do you know Kathryn, that there are moments in one's life, a single instant, a thought perhaps, in which you experience something so perfect, so complete but it's gone before you know that you desired it?"

"That must be beautiful, Chakotay. A moment in which everything around you moved respectfully away, leaving you in that perfect suspension of total happiness. Like now..." she whispered as she bent over him and brushed his lips with her fingers. His eyes closed at the touch.

"How often do we get these moments of complete solitude, Kathryn?" he asked softly, turning his head against her bosom, breathing in her perfume.

"Almost never," she replied. "It is a rare gift, Chakotay..."

"We should treasure these moments, Kathryn. For all time."

"Yes... years from now we could open our little treasure trove of memories and look on this night as a night in which we were both perfectly happy and experienced that rare moment people dream of their whole lifetime: perfect peace and harmony."

"Joy."

"Yes, Joy. A moment never to be forgotten."

There was a long pause in which Kathryn Janeway and Chakotay fell into reflecting again on the rare opportunity when they were together and could just share complete oneness. He would touch her cheek, caress it and gently brush the softness of it. Then she would sigh and lie back again with her eyes closed, allowing her old tiredness, the rigours of her work to flow and wash from her, each breath taking away some of the strain. Her heart rushed with emotion when she felt him press into her, so trusting and beloved.

"I love you, Chakotay," she said softly.

"My Kathryn," he answered, half raising himself to look into her eyes.

There was another long silence, broken only by their calm breathing, and the soft thrum of the ship's engines as it travelled through warp.

"Have you ever seen an Indiana moon, Chakotay?" Kathryn asked suddenly.

"Where you grew up? No, I've never been there..."

"On cold nights when the moon is full, it's the most beautiful sight to behold. A stark, yellow disc against the deep indigo of the sky… I used to stand outside and try to touch the moon as it rose over the hills of Indiana."

"You can't touch the moon - "

"Humour me, Chakotay," she said sternly, then softened again. "It's so close, you can reach out with your hand and almost feel the texture as the moon hung against the cold black firmament."

"Then it must have been truly beautiful, Kathryn."

"Sometimes I experienced that feeling of perfect peace, of Joy when I looked at the moon, so beautiful and majestic..."

"Then I'd say in your heart, my Kathryn, it was not impossible."

"Sometimes...sometimes I dream I am back in Indiana, looking up at the moon," she said on such a wistful note that he sat up and drew her into his arms.

"One day Kathryn, I swear we'll get home and you can touch your Indiana moon..."

She hugged him fiercely then, and both thought in that moment how they would treasure yet another memory forever.

***

**Day 207**

The woman who walked down the debris strewn corridor looked gaunt. There were dark shadows under her eyes; her cheeks were sunken and smudged. She had an unhealthy pallor and she looked emaciated. She paid little attention to her appearance. She could very well have just smoothed her hair down with the palms of her hands. In her tank top her arms protruded as two thin sticks and her collarbones jutted angrily as if no skin covered them.

There was a scar on her right cheek, stretching from just below her eye to the jaw. Her hands were scarred too, but she appeared oblivious of these scars. She held a tricorder and barked orders from time to time to the little man following her. They stopped suddenly when her tricorder picked up a signal.

"The gravitational plating in this room is buckled," she said as she pointed to the inside of the room.

"Chakotay's quarters," she heard Neelix say as they entered through the open section. Her tricorder kept beeping, indicating an anomalous reading.

They stepped carefully over debris. Everywhere the ship looked like this, she thought. Badly damaged, hardly functioning. There was almost nothing left of Voyager as she made her way through Chakotay's quarters. She hadn't been here since they were last so happy... It had been a hallowed moment, so private that she felt like closing her eyes and running out again. 

 _Chakotay, my love..._  the silent words burned through her, a dull throb in her heart as she began looking around. Was he here in the spirit? Was he watching her? She gave a sudden shiver.

Seconds later she reached the area where the signal was the strongest. She lifted a piece of plating to reveal something silver. Her heart thudded wildly for a few moments as she looked at the 19th century silver watch and fob. Clearing some dust off it she held it in the palm of her hand. It felt heavy, ornate in its carved outer edges, with the hands still at 10h10, she noticed.  _The only object lying around on this ship still intact, still whole_. The heavy fob chain hung over her hand and very tenderly, reverently she smoothed over its surface with her fingers.

"An exact replica of the one used by the captain of a frigate in the nineteenth century British Navy. Happy birthday, Kathryn," Chakotay had said that day. She had been so busy then, too angry at him that he'd wasted valuable replicator rations on it. A gift for her.

A rush of emotion, a constriction in her throat. She was afraid of becoming undone. She spoke softly, pensively.

"You disobeyed orders..."

"Captain?" It was Neelix who sounded puzzled. She didn't look at him when she spoke again.

"Chakotay gave this to me five months ago. A birthday gift. I ordered him to - "

She felt her eyes sting with tears and tried desperately not to let Neelix see her distress. 

_Oh Chakotay... my love..._

Neelix had little idea what his captain was referring to, but he kept quiet. Captain Janeway was a driven woman, more than what he had ever seen before. Driven even more since the day Chakotay and Tom were captured by Annorax. She existed on guilt alone, he thought. She seemed to have internalised her own anger, feeding off it to keep going. Even in these hopeless months when they were constantly under attack, it was her indomitable spirit, her unbelievable courage in the face of such incredible adversity that kept the rest of them going. She was strong, taxed herself beyond human endurance.

Yet now... looking at her.  _She's vulnerable again_. The captain was hurting again and there was nothing he could do but stand and watch. Always watch.

Kathryn Janeway held up the watch and felt the raw pain again. A single memory surfaced.

_"One day, Kathryn, I swear we'll get home and you can touch your Indiana moon again..."_

Those had been happier times, when she was Kathryn and he was Chakotay, when she could forget for a short while that she was Captain and he was her first officer. She longed for that moment again, that moment of perfect peace. She longed suddenly, for Indiana and those moonlit nights when she stood outside watching the giant disc move noiselessly across the dark sky.

Now he was gone.

_You were right, Chakotay. I had to let the crew leave after all. I couldn't ask them to stay, you know? To have done so, would have been to ask them to die. I couldn't let them die, Chakotay. I pray they will find their way home._

_You understood that before I did. You always knew me better that I did myself. I had been so driven then, so much the Captain. And you? You supported me even when you knew I could be wrong._

Kathryn Janeway clutched the watch convulsively in her hand, the fingers curling painfully around the cold silver as she remembered his words.

"I replicated this months ago, Kathryn," he had said quietly.

"It could mean an extra pair of boots, a hypospray..."

She had tried not to look at him in those moments, because she had known she would see the hurt in his eyes. She'd sent him off like a headstrong school boy and had forgotten in those moments how much he had meant to her, how much he still meant to her. Her dirt-stained face puckered and she battled not to cry.

 _I miss you so much. We were going to see our moon together, one day_. _We were going to touch our Indiana moon…_

For a second his face flashed before her. He had a smile that reached his eyes, the dimples in his cheeks that always made her heart lurch. The tattoo on his forehead was so clear she could reach out and touch it, trace every line with her fingers. Her hand did go out to touch it but there was no face, no Chakotay.

She rose suddenly, as if she made a decision. Neelix braced himself when Kathryn Janeway turned to face him. She had secured the chain to her belt. Now the watch hanged down her left side. She stood there, hand touching Chakotay's gift.

"Well, what do you think?" she asked him.

"Handsome," he said, and smiled because she had a smile on her face. Neelix was relieved. She had a softer aspect to her face now, as if she had some peace at last.

They left Chakotay's quarters to resume their duties elsewhere on what remained of Voyager. Seven remaining crew of Voyager fighting an uneven battle, a battle that broke the valiant ship up bit by bit, chipping away at its hull, its bulkheads... Seven crew members who looked as battle-scarred as Voyager, who were battle weary but fought doggedly to remain on the ship, to find the weapon ship and destroy it. They braved insurmountable odds to keep Voyager from becoming a drifting derelict in space. An old memory drove them, of a vision  of what had once been a magnificent intrepid starship with only one quest - to reach home...

*****

On the Weapon Ship.

He dreamed of her again. Always the same dream. They would lie in her quarters and she would cushion his head on her lap and they would talk softly. She would caress his hair, his face, trace the outline of his tattoo. He would reach up and run his fingers through her hair.

He remembered how she smiled, teased, kissed. He remembered little details like snatches of conversations, words, gestures, the way her mouth curved into a smile. He missed her, remembered not that she had been angry with him, or refused to consider his arguments of letting the crew find their way home. He remembered all that had been good between them. Their love, everything that he thought the universe could contain in one single molecule.

Joy...

He wondered how Tom was doing. They had been separated the second they were beamed aboard this ship. The ship that could control time, determine history and the destinies of nations. They had been prodded and tested, for what he didn't know. But he was tired, he needed a shave badly. He felt dirty, unkempt. Perhaps it was just the strategy of the ship's commander to let them rot in their little hell before he would let them out and they could hail him as a sort of saviour.

After two months they were able to see each other and see Annorax. Annorax invited them to sit down and feast on the remains of ancient races and civilizations.

"I want none of this, Tom said.

"Sit down, Tom," he ordered.

"He can't be trusted, Chakotay."

"I can control the destiny of a single molecule or an entire civilization," Annorax boasted. Chakotay could sense how Tom bristled.

"This vessel is more than a weapon. It is a museum of lost histories," he continued.

He was interested in Annorax's theories, wanted to know whether Voyager could be saved.

"You're an anomalous component," Annorax said, "disconnected, impossible to predict. You have no idea how you have complicated my mission..."

It was Tom who was astute to realise that Annorax couldn't find Voyager.

"He'll destroy her if he could, Chakotay. Don't trust him..."

"I'm interested, Tom. He could save the Krenim and Voyager without harming anyone."

"And you believe him? I want none of it, Commander. None of it," Tom repeated, then left the dining room. Obrist followed him to show him his new quarters, while Chakotay remained behind with Annorax to discuss how they could restore the Krenim and Voyager.

How stupid he had been!

By the time he did the first simulation, he erased a comet and fifty light-years around it, wiping out civilizations of billions of years old. By the time Tom left, one civilization had been wiped out...

*******

The next time Tom cornered him...

"He is mad, Chakotay. He thinks time has a grudge against him."

He wanted to believe Annorax had noble intentions. He lost his wife on Keana Prime. He wanted to restore time so that he could restore his wife. Was that so bad?

"He is wiping out civilizations to do that, Chakotay! If you don't do something about stopping him, I will," Tom said angrily.

"Either we maintain a command structure here, Tom, or we can settle our differences the old fashioned way." He could see Tom was angry enough to disobey his instructions.

"Where are we, Chakotay? On Voyager, where you can command me?"

It was difficult to say who landed to the first blow. They were in his quarters, and he had been thinking and dreaming about Kathryn again and despaired that he would ever see her again. He was distressed, and Tom... Tom fuelled his anger.

He was stockier, stronger. He felled Tom with his first blow, bringing the helmsman to his knees. But Tom recovered immediately, rising quickly. Tom's agility and athleticism counted in his favour as he ducked Chakotay's blows. He sagged when Chakotay landed a fist square against his jaw.

It was a wordless fight, one in which they expended their frustrations at being kept prisoner. They took out their frustrations on each other, each blow harder as they remembered the women they left behind. Chakotay tasted the blood in his mouth, he saw Tom's nose bleed. They were dazed, yet they kept on and on and on. Finally both of them sagged to the floor, beaten, discouraged.

They tried to sit up, were groggy at first. At last Chakotay managed to sit, his shoulders hunched and shaking like a leaf. Tom looked at him.

"I'm sorry, Commander..."

"Forget it, Tom," he barked.

"You miss her, don't you?"

He looked at Tom in surprise. He didn't think they knew. He wanted to deny it, but Tom's eyes held a certain understanding. Perhaps it was because Tom missed B'Elanna. He never gave it a thought, he realised now. He had been so intent on assisting Annorax, going along with his ideas, missing Kathryn with every fibre in his body. He just never thought about Tom missing B'Elanna.

"Yes... Yes, I miss her," he admitted finally, feeling a great sense of relief washing over him as he looked at Tom and saw Tom nod. "I love her, you know..."

"We all knew that, Commander. For a long time. You - " Tom paused, wondering if he should say what he wanted to say next.

"We were just wondering when you were going to tell us formally, Chakotay..."

Chakotay smiled stiffly, wiped the blood from his mouth with the back of his hand. He moved so that he could sit next to Tom where the younger man had been bracing himself against the bulkhead. Like that they remained and talked.

"It was very difficult, you must know that, Tom. She was always aware that she was Captain of Voyager and that we had to observe those protocols more than letting our feelings dictate our actions."

"And so the Captain would be Captain more times than she allowed herself to be Kathryn," Tom said softly.

Chakotay looked at him with surprise, then looked quickly away again, before Tom could see his further distress.

"Yes, you're right. I wonder..."

"What?"

"What happened to the gift I gave her for her birthday. It was a watch and chain I replicated an eternity ago..."

"I guess she asked you to recycle it," Tom said with sudden clarity.

"She asked me alright, but I didn't, after all. Left it in my quarters. I wonder what Voyager looks like now..." He looked at Tom, and smiled wanly. He knew they had to get away from here, try to restore the time and rescue Voyager if they could, or Voyager rescue them.

They were quiet for a while, then Chakotay spoke again.

"She used to tell me of her home state on Earth, Indiana - "

"Indiana is beautiful," Tom said.

"That's what she said. She said on a clear, cold and dark night when the moon is full rising over the hills of Indiana, it is so close you can touch it."

"So you promised her the moon..."

"Yeah, I did," he laughed mirthlessly. "I did. Promised her that when we got home, we'd touch the moon together. She missed it, Tom. You have no idea how she sounded and looked whenever she spoke of home."

Tom glanced at Chakotay and thought he had never seen the Commander so vulnerable, so raw and open in his feelings. He was hurting badly. It was more than just being held captive on this weapon ship, Tom knew. It was his heart that tugged so hard in the direction of Kathryn Janeway that he could see on Chakotay's face,  pain when he thought no one noticed. Kathryn's angry warrior who would die for her.

"Chakotay, I can send a message from the comfort of my quarters to Voyager. You know I've befriended Obrist. The crew here are ready to mutiny. They are as unhappy as we are being here. And they have been here two hundred years."

That was after Annorax reneged on a promise not to harm any civilization. But "You grab the opportunity when it comes, Chakotay," he'd said before giving the order to fire. That was when Chakotay had become convinced that Annorax was unstable, that although he had noble ideals, he destroyed everything in his path to get it. It sickened Chakotay, distressed him especially when he realised Tom had been right all along.

"Then let's do it, Tom. The only difficulty I foresee is - "

"Disabling the ship's temporal core so that Voyager's last remaining torpedoes can penetrate its hull. I know..."

"And Tom - "

"Yeah?"

"Give Kathryn my best..."

He gave Chakotay a smile, nodded before he left to his own quarters.

*********

**Day 226**

A sombre atmosphere hung over the battered bridge of Voyager as Kathryn Janeway addressed her last remaining crew. They were filled with a sense of the old excitement of going into battle, and at the same time a sense of dread.

They felt much like a mother who sent her son to war knowing that her son might never return. The Captain spoke calmly, infusing them with her own drive, her own sense of purpose. They were going to engage the weapon ship and get their two crew members out. If anyone of the remaining crew on the bridge in those moments thought to grumble, or to lose faith, to state their own precarious position, she calmed them, giving them reassurances that they were fighting together. Their allies were there to back them and supply valuable support.

"I've analyzed every carrier frequency and this one is a classified Starfleet I.D code which came, I am dead certain, from Tom Paris."

"Location."

Tuvok.

"They are fifty light-years from here and as soon as we are in range, Tom will attempt to take their temporal core off line. We have six photon torpedoes that will penetrate the hull of the weapon ship."

Kathryn Janeway looked at each of her senior crew. Then she gave them their final orders. B'Elanna and Harry had to ensure that all the ships in their fleet had temporal shielding. Seven, Neelix and Tuvok were to join the Nahidarin vessels and co-coordinate from there.

"There is no doubt, Doctor," the captain said, "that your services will be required once this attack is under way." The Doctor nodded, a serious expression on his face. He knew Kathryn Janeway was going to push herself beyond her limits. He admired her, never more as he did in these moments.

When B'Elanna questioned the condition of Voyager Kathryn Janeway answered, "You know the adage: The Captain goes down with the ship..."

The EMH had a feeling of foreboding as Kathryn Janeway uttered those words. He wondered whether any of them would survive this attack. He had to admit that given the odds, they would not. In which case he was glad that the Captain let the crew go so many months ago to find their own way to the Alpha Quadrant. Perhaps, he thought, something good will have come from this incredible sacrifice the senior crew was making for their ship and their captured crew mates.

"I feel as close to Voyager as I do to my crew, Tuvok," she said softly.

She raised her palms to cup Tuvok's cheeks. His unseeing eyes staring fixedly. "Old friend..." she whispered, then hugged him gently, staying like that for long, long seconds. She felt his hands coming up to touch her shoulders, hugging her in return. Then she released him. Tuvok raised his hand in a Vulcan salute.

"Live long and prosper, Captain," he said before Seven came and led him away.

******

She was alone on the bridge, staring around her before her gaze fixed on the chair next to hers. She clutched her watch tighter in her hands, prayed fervently.

"Very soon, my love, we'll be together again. Very soon," she whispered softly as she seated herself in her command chair, arms outstretched in front of her on the armrests. Kathryn Janeway, Captain of the Starship Voyager: Intrepid Class, sat alone on the bridge of the ship, and led their small armada to the weapon ship.

*******

**Day 257**

On the bridge of the weapon ship Annorax bristled the moment he was informed that six ships were within weapons range. Years later Tom Paris could only surmise that Chakotay had been killed by Annorax the second Obrist tried to disable the temporal core for the fleet to launch their attack. He even said that Chakotay might have shielded Obrist, since Annorax's Executive Officer had been on their side. It was Tuvok who relayed the message to Janeway on the bridge of Voyager that Tom Paris had been beamed aboard their battle cruiser.

"Chakotay is dead, Tuvok," Tom said bleakly as he looked in Tuvok's unseeing eyes.

That was when Annorax fired on them, destroying two vessels, one heading direct in Voyager's path. It struck her port bow, ripping it open. Kathryn Janeway was flung from her chair at the conn. Already gravely injured, she stared in silent horror at the gaping hole in the hull of the bow, protected only by the shielding. She watched as Voyager careened on a collision course with the weapon ship. There were no more torpedoes and the other ships were disabled.

C _hakotay...my love... I am coming..._ were her last coherent thoughts as Voyager collided with the weapon ship, its temporal core still online, its crew dead or dying. Together, with Voyager, they lit up the sky in an explosion such as those watching from the other ships had never seen in close battle.

From the other ships they watched the tableau. As if in slow motion Voyager moved inexorably in the direction of the weapon ship and collided in a giant explosion.

In the vastness of the universe, in the great scheme of things eternal, Kathryn Janeway and her first officer Commander Chakotay came together again, in life, in death, for all time.

*******

Over a period of twenty years members of the crew of Voyager ended up in the Alpha Quadrant. They returned home by whatever means they could as Captain Kathryn Janeway had instructed them so long ago. The senior crew, among them Tom Paris and his wife B'Elanna arrived five years after Voyager had been destroyed.

All those who returned spoke of Captain Janeway's valour, her spirit which kept all of them going. Even when they were discouraged, when they were at their lowest ebb, she and Commander Chakotay were with them in the spirit, encouraging them never to give up, to find their way home.

Ensign Samantha Wildman was able to present her daughter, now a strapping preteen, to her husband, Ghreskrendrek. Joe Carey saw his wife and sons again after six years. When Lieutenant Magnus Rollins saw his eldest son, James was a senior cadet at Starfleet Academy. Tuvok and Seven stayed together until they were rescued and finally made it to the Alpha Quadrant. Tuvok's eyesight was restored, and Seven remained with his family.

So it was that the signals from the escape pods had been picked up. Their occupants found safe havens and through various means eighty five percent of the crew of Voyager was accounted for. Also, those who did not return were on the Federation's Search List for the time it took the Federation to revolutionise transwarp technology and continue searching for missing crew.

B'Elanna Paris and Harry Kim had, when Kathryn Janeway addressed them that last time, taken Voyager's computer records and downloaded them into the computers of the ship they were on. The records therefore of Voyager's exploits and her journey home were intact. It told of many heroic deeds, told of their many adversities, their contact with strange new worlds, new peoples, the many friends they made, also the enemies they had.

The records told of each crewmember's dedication and loyalty to Kathryn Janeway, of their love and admiration for her and Voyager's first officer. They spoke of infractions, of crew assigned to solitary confinement. The records spoke of the Captain's strength of character, her constant reminder that they were to observe Starfleet rules and Federation laws. The records also spoke of the sense of family and home Kathryn Janeway and her First Officer created on Voyager, being an assembly of Federation and Maquis crew and officers.

Each crewmember who eventually returned to the Alpha Quadrant recounted their own experiences. Neelix spoke of his lungs that were stolen by the Vidiians. B'Elanna spoke of how same Vidiians split her into a full Klingon and human. Tom could speak of his warp ten flight, how he infiltrated the Kazon and flushed out a spy on board Voyager. He could speak of how he landed Voyager when the entire crew were dumped on an alien world, of Lon Suder who died because he wanted to do something "for the ship".

Yet all of them had a common thread in the individual tales they passed on to heir families, their children and grandchildren - the superlative leadership of the Captain Janeway of Voyager and Commander Chakotay. This was more than sufficient for Starfleet Command to enter into the permanent records of Captain Kathryn Janeway that she died a hero's death and with her, her first officer, whom Thomas Eugene Paris swore could not have been a better friend than in the time they were held captive on the time ship.

*******

A legend arose around these events of the death a starship, its captain and her first officer. It was Tom Paris who first claimed he saw it. He and his wife B'Elanna, with their daughter whom they named Kathryn Miral, visited the state of Indiana every year.

"He was going to give her the moon, B'Elanna," Tom said as he carried baby Kathryn and stood at the edge of the lake.

"She must have loved him very much, Tom," she said softly, looking at the full moon.

"Chakotay said that there are moments when you are completely happy, one with the universe and everything around you. That is when you experience Joy." Tom looked at the cold Indiana moon, then at his wife. "Chakotay told me that, B'Elanna, when we were prisoners on the weapon ship."

"I know, Tom. You have told me that many times."

"Indulge me, sweetheart," he pleaded, his eyes very blue.

"Look!" B'Elanna pointed into the dark distance, with only the moon throwing its golden light on the shimmering water. "There!"

Tom blinked once, twice, not certain that what he saw was real. There appeared in the distance, sylphlike, a figure which moved in graceful dance. She wore a long white dress of diaphanous folds and swirls. At her waist they saw something shiny which hung on a chain...

"Tom, she _never_ removed that watch from her belt. She wore it all the time," B'Elanna whispered.

"Her Dying Swan dress," he added softly as they watched the figure move in graceful cadences with arms outstretched to the moon, reaching out and touching it. At some point the woman turned, facing them and they could see a scar on her right cheek...

"Look, B'Elanna!" Tom exclaimed, pointing  as they watched the woman's figure move. They saw another figure rose out of the dark, clothed in the dark brown suit and leather boots he last wore when he was a captive in those first days.

And as he shifted with the moon, they saw his tattoo as moonbeams flitted across his features.

It was gone as quickly as it appeared, but Tom and B'Elanna were convinced of what they had seen.  _The experience of complete harmony, of total bliss and Joy is gone before you realise that you desired it_. Tom remembered the words of Chakotay on the weapon ship.

"He did promise her that he would bring her back here, to touch the moon," Tom said, a smile on his face. He felt extraordinary lucky, privileged to have witnessed this little tableau.

Baby Kathryn, awake at last in her Daddy's arms, stirred and fretted impatiently. But her Mama and Daddy's eyes were transfixed on something strange. She turned in Tom's arms in time to see the vanishing figures of the two spirit like creatures that vanished in the light of the golden moon. She raised her pudgy little arm and waved.

A new legend was born.

Many of the old Voyager crew would come to Indiana when it was full moon, hoping to see what Tom and B'Elanna Paris saw that first time. Sometimes they were lucky, other times they turned back to their own homes, disappointed. They would each have a different story to tell. Some would say they saw both Kathryn and Chakotay in their uniforms, others would say that they wore other modes of dress. Some never saw the watch and chain, others again that they saw Chakotay wearing it. Each one who came to Indiana added their little piece to the tale so that many years later, quite many years later, it was a fantastic story told to every new cadet who entered Starfleet and who hoped to make the stars his home.

"Such was the stuff legends were made of," Tom Paris told his daughter the day her mother placed the Klingon amulet around her neck. At sixteen Kathryn Miral Paris was a budding beauty, with the slight ridges on her forehead, her golden hair and dark brown eyes. She had been brought up with the tales of Voyager, her intrepid crew, and the fantastic woman whose name she bore, Kathryn Janeway.

Yes, she knew of Kathryn and her Chakotay and the Legend of the Indiana Moon.

***

**the end**


End file.
